Last month, OpenAI made an announcement that surprised the AI community. They revealed their plans to enable people to build their personalized chatbots using the popular ChatGPT model. These chatbots, called “GPTs” or Generative Pre-Trained Transformers, can be customized and tailored to specific topics and use cases.

The launch was slated for this month (Dec. 2023). But those plans have now been pushed back to early 2024, with OpenAI citing recent “unexpected things” that have occupied its time and resources. While the company did not elaborate on the specific reasons behind the delay, it likely stems from the whirlwind leadership crisis that engulfed OpenAI over the past few weeks.

On November 17th, OpenAI’s board made the abrupt decision to remove CEO Sam Altman from his position, cryptically stating that he had not been “consistently candid” with the board and that this was “hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities.” This inflammatory accusation touched off a revolt within the company, with nearly all employees signing a petition threatening to quit if Altman was not reinstated.

Last Wednesday, the turmoil came to an end with the reinstatement of Altman along with a reshuffled OpenAI board. But the entire ordeal took a toll on operations, overshadowing the company’s product roadmap and plans for the GPT Store launch.

While the leadership issues may now be settled, the delay of the GPT Store will likely provide an opening for competitors. Companies like Anthropic and You [.com] are racing to release similar customizable AI assistants to the public. And tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and Tencent have all recently unveiled their own ChatGPT alternatives as well.

By postponing its online marketplace for custom chatbots, OpenAI risks squandering its first-mover advantage in democratizing access to generative AI. It remains to be seen if rolling out GPT Store in early 2024 will still have the same impact, or if users will have already moved on to the next big thing in AI.

The leadership crisis may be over, but OpenAI is still picking up the pieces. The delay of a core product reflects how much institutional turmoil can set back even the most cutting-edge AI labs. OpenAI built its reputation on moving fast without breaking things. Now it finds itself trying to move fast while piecing things back together.